Britain’s recession wasn’t so bad after all

Share via

Britain’s recession was not as deep as previously thought but will still go down in the history books as the worst downturn since the Second World War.

Figures from the Office for National Statistics, published yesterday, showed that economic output fell by 4.6 per cent between 2007 and 2009. The ONS had previously estimated that GDP shrank by as much as 6 per cent.

The better than expected figures were down to how the economy performed in 2008. GDP is now thought to have contracted by 0.3 per cent that year, compared with the previous estimate of a 1.1 per